A couple of years ago the city in their infinite wisdom decided to place Swales all over the Maspeth area.
Few worked out okay most did not.
To see the ones that did not take a drive down 63rd Street between 59th Avenue and 59th Drive, right behind Reiff Park. You will be astounded, shocked, dismayed, appalled, sickened horrified and repulsed by how the city has maintained these, ahem, wonderful Swales.
Sincerely,
Philipe the pissed
20 comments:
You will be astounded, shocked, dismayed, appalled, sickened horrified and repulsed by how the city...
Nope. Regular readers of Queenscrap have seen so much that they don't register these reactions anymore.
The ones in Manhattan are grotesque also.
It's a shame the people with property fronting these don't get involved in their upkeep.
Last year the flooded the area with these bioswales. They even had the man power to tend to them. This year all the lovely perennials gone. Garbage in them. Overgrown weeds and flooded to the tops when it rains and sits there for a day a two. Then I noticed the increase of black ants all over the streets here. No matter how you clean they are all over. Was it the heat of the summer or the flooded bioswales? Where was the man power this year to tend to them? I guess we are stuck with these eye sores here in Maspeth. Another great idea and at the taxpayer expense.
No surprises. These are essentially garden or natural landscape features that require weekly cleaning and maintenance. Was a folly 10 years ago to think this would be done, and a folly now.
Let's place the blame where it belongs; some f'ing vehicle driver who mounted the sidewalk and destroyed the fence and tree.
This happens all the time here in Manhattan. It is usually the private garbage haulers who back their trucks onto the sidewalk and plow down anything in the path.
Our building added cameras facing the sidewalk after two trees and small fances were destroyed by these characters. Now, we hold them responsible.
This is one thing you can't blame the City for, we are not supposed to go around fixing the fuckups these careless jerks cause.
Rob in Manhattan
Collossal waste of time and money. Bioswales have replaced the trash recepticles that the Sanitation Department removed from the street corners.
Can't blame the City? It's a fact that drivers will mount the curbs, as you have pointed out. So before spending the public's hard earned money, this should have been taken into consideration. You can't wish bad human behavior away. Sometimes you just have to gauge it and act accordingly. Just another liberal democrat idea gone astray. Bioswales! Bye, Bye!
If the design was to simply place crushed stone over weed blocker fabric, fine. But no, we gotta put flowers and plants in each one. What a joke.
To add, I saw a video on Linkedin of a pavement product that allows water to permeate through, thus eliminating the need for the aluminum fence. Engineers...lol.
Rob said:
"Let's place the blame where it belongs;... we are not supposed to go around fixing the fuckups these careless jerks cause.
Okay, let's say it's the fault of non-caring commercial drivers. Then lets place the same blame on the residents of NYCHA who fuck up their own buildings and let's blame the students in public education who screw up school property and let's blame their parents for not making sure their kids study and graduate and let's blame the politicians who treat their constituents like they are human refuse while pandering to developers and corporate interests and let's blame...why go on when no one really cares.
Third world population...third world bioswales
What we should be astounded at is the ease with which we license incompetent drivers.
So to make your point about how poorly the bioswales are maintained you had to find the one that was run over by a car or truck?
This email was sent to me in August. It's now October and the swales have not been cleaned/repaired. That's the main issue here.
The ones in Forest Hills are just as bad. Garbage collection sites and overgrown w weeds.
Yeah I've seen some bioswales aka rain gardens that are really overgrown with weeds and litter.DEP said they would be maintained by the Park's Dept.and eventually they were cleaned and weeded.It's the same problem with tree pits,they need to be cleaned of weeds and litter but most home and business owners don't think it's their job.If property owners are required to clean and maintain the sidewalk then they would have to do the same for tree pits.I don't think Sanitation gives out tickets for tree pits, some of the ones on Grand Ave are in terrible shape and the wrought iron tree guards are badly damaged and are a hazard to pedestrians and people getting in and out of cars.I've called Park's Dept. and they say the tree guards are not their responsibility, aren't street trees and the pits their responsibility?
How about a law that dictates if you have a bio-swale in front of your house you must keep it clean of weeds and garbage? In return the home owner should be allowed a tax deduction for that work. How about $250 a year?
"How about a law that dictates if you have a bio-swale in front of your house you must keep it clean of weeds and garbage? In return the home owner should be allowed a tax deduction for that work. How about $250 a year?"
Great idea but the way this city works they will listen to the first part of that but don't expect to see anything in return. In fact expect to be ticketed if you don't keep it clean.
Why were these bioswales put in??? One guess is so many people took the grass out and cemented it all up. So over here on the Plateau you either got a tree or a rain garden. It happened to my neighbor he took it all out and cemented it all up and two bioswales! You know the city could go back and look at the pictures of every property and see what you really had there. Hint: Grass and a tree. I saw pictures of my house and in front grass and a sick looking tree circa 1974. So as for the tax break or tax incentives nah I will keep the tree.
Why were these bioswales put in???
To help deal with the runoff from heavy rains, since our combined sewers cannot handle it in many neighborhoods, especially with (legal or illegal) multi-family dwellings that have multiple toilets and showers, aside from the houses that pave over lawns. It's a good idea in theory, but requires regular upkeep, which NYC won't or can't do.
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